Walking the Camino

 In April and May, I walked across most of Spain.

In the moments and weeks of the walk, walking was normal. Everyone around me was walking the Camino de Santiago in northern Spain. We all got up early each morning and tended out feet, put on our boots, pulled on our packs and went looking for coffee and yellow arrows.  We all pulled off our boots and examined our blistered feet in public and offered sympathy and bandaids to perfect strangers. That's what life was.


The Camino was harder than I expected and more rewarding than I thought it would be. My life has not been fundamentaly changed by this experience. Instead, my soul was deeply enriched and my spirit stirred and soothed all at the same time.

And now I'm home. Back to another nornal.  It took hours on a plane, several days in a car and two more beds other than my own to return to my cabin in the hills.  I'm exhausted and my last souvenir was a nasty cold.  My 91 year old mother had several falls while I was gone and has diminished so much it was a jolt to my heart when she greeted me. One of the falls dislodged her hip and, in the two months since they determined she needed a total hip replacement, the stump of damaged ball wore a hole through the socket.  Her pain has been intense and debilitating.  Welcome home to me.

But Mom had surgery Monday and she felt good enough to have soup and yogurt the same night. She's brave and strong and completely ready to risk death as to not live in pain.  I appreciate her independence now as much as I resented it as a young adult. She is a force to be reckoned with and ignored Death to live her life. She said she'd either live without pain or she go home to Jesus, win-win.

So how do I, how do we continue to live in our "normal" while longing for the particular event that was so soul enriching, something that connected us to a community we didn't even know existed?



Perhaps my big Camino lesson was- "Get up and do it again."  For me it was walking- everyday. Rain or shine. Cold or hot. I walkded with sore muscles, sleep deprivation, and a bad attitude.  I didn't walk because I'm strong or commited or love to form new blisters. I walked because I wanted to finish this goal I had set and...  I had a plane to catch on the other side of the country.  And in that discipline, I was so blessed.  Blessed with friends, renewed confidence in my body and a resevoir of stories and images.

This blog will concentrate on the Camino until we're all tired of it. I want my story to resonate with you, even if you've never walked 500 miles to catch an airline flight! I want to share lessons and muses, some pictures of Spain and stories of people. And I do this as much for myself as anyone. I don't want to forget.  I want to integrate my two normals and walk my journey forward, regularly reminded of my amazing walk into the heart of a country and into my own.

Buen Camino


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camino_de_Santiago